The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : Ghat road closure hits LPG supply

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Oct 26, 2007
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Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

Ghat road closure hits LPG supply

Swathi Shivanand and Anil Kumar Sastry

Tankers travel 500 km more to reach Bangalore from Mangalore

The city requires about 70,000 cylinders a day
Indane is better placed as it gets gas by rail

BANGALORE: Shyamala S., a homemaker at HSR Layout, booked a cylinder 15 days ago. But until now, she has not received it from the gas company.

“We are able to manage because our second cylinder is not over yet. Hopefully, we will get the cylinder soon,” she says.

Consumers in the city have been forced to wait longer than usual for their domestic liquefied petroleum gas cylinders as the complete closure of Shiradi Ghat, an important road link between Bangalore and Mangalore, has thrown off gear the supply of the precious cooking fuel to the city.

Tankers from Mangalore Refineries and Chemicals Ltd. (MRPL) are now taking the alternative route through Hubli, sources at Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd. (HPCL) and Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd. (BPCL), two main LPG suppliers in the city, told The Hindu. The sources said the situation had returned to normal this Monday. Bangalore requires over 70,000 cylinders a day, according to conservative estimates made by public sector petroleum companies.

Shiradi Ghat on NH 48 is a vital connection as no other Ghat section connecting the southern coast with Bangalore is wide enough to accommodate the 14-wheeled bullet tankers carrying LPG from MRPL.

With closure of this section now, tankers from Mangalore have to move all the way up to Ankola, climb the Arabail Ghat and reach Bangalore via Hubli.

While the distance between Mangalore and Bangalore is 350 km via Shiradi, it is 850 km via Ankola and Hubli. “While earlier the trucks took a day to reach the city, they now take about three or four days. This has added to our expenses also,” said a senior official at HPCL.

Sources at BPCL said they had been able to meet the demands by arranging for LPG from Chennai and Hyderabad. Additional trucks had been deployed by the two companies to make up for the extra distance.

Indian Oil Corporation (Indane), HPCL and BPCL largely cater to the LPG requirements in the city. While Indane is better placed as it transports LPG through rail, the company is facing more than its usual demands as consumers of other companies faced with delayed supply, are knocking on its doors, sources at Indane said.

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